The former Securitate have made Lt. Col Gheorghe Trosca of the USLA into a posthumous hero. Heck, there is a monument celebrating the alleged martyrdom of him and other USLASi at M.Ap.N. on the night of 23/24 December 1989. They have spun an elaborate, if predictable myth, that Trosca and his men were victims of a cynical trap set by Soviet spies among Romania’s military generals–most notably Nicolae Militaru–to eliminate them so they could not talk and present their alleged proof of that espionage. The amount of revisionism and disinformation in this tale is pretty amazing, but it is based on a series of lies that ignore who assigned Trosca to this mission (his boss, Gheorghe “Bula Moise” Ardeleanu, who has said as much), and in particular the revelations at the time and in the immediate aftermath by the soldiers who were defending the M.Ap.N. headquarters and the residents of the blocs surrounding it. Trosca’s rehabilitation was and is important to the former Securitate and a central myth of their attempt to cover up their failed counter-revolution in December 1989. (The SPM relies most recently on Constantin Isac, a former USLA officer, who was involved in the preventive repression against demonstrators in Iasi on 14 December 1989, per his own revelation, as a primary source for their understanding of what happened at M.Ap.N. on the night of 23/24 December 1989! https://www.gandul.ro/actualitate/interviu-seful-parchetelor-militare-catalin-pitu-declaratii-incendiare-culisele-anchetei-dosarul-revolutie-agresiv-la-audieri-au-disparut-microfilme-documente-19716264 )
Anyway, to believe the former Securitate and the vast majority of the Romanian media that has swallowed its tall tales, Trosca was an elite specialist, merely involved in conventional anti-terrorist missions–never mind that the USLA was also an organ of repression against Romania’s citizens who were deemed as “terrorists”–i.e. those opposed to and perceived as threatening the “socialist order” and Nicolae Ceausescu’s rule. Little has come forward about Trosca’s whereabouts or activities before 22 December 1989. Petre Mihai Bacanu and the late Romulus Cristea, at Romania Libera, partly it would appear due to information or documents directly or indirectly leaked to them by military prosecutors (most likely Dan Voinea), have hinted at this in the past I believe, and Marius Mioc from Timisoara also has I believe. Below, two of the testimonies that place Trosca in the thick of the “crowd control” and repression of 21/22 December 1989 in Bucharest, right along side Gheorghe Ardeleanu and other USLA higher-ups. Who do these revelations come from? No less than a fellow USLA official, Virgil Popa, and Ion Apostolescu of the Securitate’s Directia a V-a.
Two other observations on the below. 1) Popa talks explicitly about the role of a group of 150-200 demonstrators pushing against the cordon blocking them off from Ceausescu’s speech on 21 December 1989, and shouting “Down with Ceausescu” and “Today in Timisoara, tomorrow in the whole country.” These are the brave demonstrators who escaped Timisoara and came by train, and about whom PMB, Cristea, Mioc, and a few others have told us through the years. It was these demonstrators who were a catalytic force, whose attempt to break through into the official crowd, caused the authorities, specifically the USLA, to react, using flashbang grenades (GELA), UNINTENTIONALLY disrupting Ceausescu’s speech. It was not as the SPM has argued in recent years, the INTENTIONAL diversionary response of the Army–see Madalin Hodor’s explanation of the absurdity of suggesting that Ilie Ceausescu was attempting to overthrow his brother in revista “22” several years ago. These Timisoara demonstrators deserve the recognition and praise of other Romanians. 2) Apostolescu refers to the young people in civilian clothes who Ardeleanu AND Trosca engaged…these I would venture to bet, were not only involved in the arrest of demonstrators in University Square, but also likely involved in their killing, as has been shown elsewhere by Bacanu and by the soldiers who witnessed it: https://romanianrevolutionofdecember1989.com/2014/12/21/25-for-the-25th-anniversary-of-the-romanian-revolution-13-the-bloody-repression-of-demonstrators-at-piata-universitatiiintercontinental/
TROSCA’s presence and role on 21/22 December 1989 in the repression is mentioned in at least the following volumes: CC vol. 57; CC vol. 59; vol 1 Deces Gen Milea.
Roland O. Thomasson, PHD 